


Soul-marked

by IshaRen



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst with a Happy Ending, Brief Phaslo, Don't worry, Enemies to soulmates, First Kiss, M/M, Phasma ships Benarmie, Pining, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Truth or Dare, benarmie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-20
Updated: 2017-05-20
Packaged: 2018-10-31 06:07:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10893294
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IshaRen/pseuds/IshaRen
Summary: Everyone knew Ben and Armie were soulmates, ever since Armie moved to Ben’s hometown when they were both ten.On the first day of fifth grade, a group gathered to proudly display their soulmate marks to the new kid, a sea of names on small arms. Armie’s eyes were inexorably drawn to theArmitageclearly marked on the forearm of a gangly dark-haired boy with huge ears. His heart stopped. Frozen in dread, he held his marked arm behind his back until the pressure of the group forced him to shakily show it to the eager circle, revealing the curly-scriptedBenon the inside of his wrist.The boy’s face lit up, wide mouth stretching into a grin, and Armie was trapped.





	Soul-marked

**Author's Note:**

> This fic came from a [generator](http://bleep0bleep.tumblr.com/prompts) prompt that my dear friend [Rachel_greatest](http://archiveofourown.org/users/rachel_greatest/pseuds/rachel_greatest) gave me. The setting was a cemetery, the genre was angst, the trope was soulmates and the prompt was Truth or Dare. Thus was this slightly odd High School AU born.
> 
> Special thanks to my wonderful friend [slutpunk](http://archiveofourown.org/users/slutpunk/pseuds/slutpunk) for betaing. Check out her works for more Kylux! She is amazing! <3

Everyone knew Ben and Armie were soulmates, ever since Armie moved to Ben’s hometown when they were both ten. 

On the first day of fifth grade, a group gathered to proudly display their soulmate marks to the new kid, a sea of names on small arms. Armie’s eyes were inexorably drawn to the _Armitage_ clearly marked on the forearm of a gangly dark-haired boy with huge ears. His heart stopped. Frozen in dread, he held his marked arm behind his back until the pressure of the group forced him to shakily show it to the eager circle, revealing the curly-scripted _Ben_ on the inside of his wrist. 

The boy’s face lit up, wide mouth stretching into a grin, and Armie was trapped. Whether it was fate or just coincidence that their names matched, it was settled: Ben and Armie were marked for each other.

Of course, that’s also when Armie decided that he didn’t like Ben at _all,_ and never would.

As they grew, so did Armie’s hostility. Ben was _annoying_ , always trying to get Armie’s attention with a range of displeasing gambits from gentle teasing to outright bullying. But they were stuck together. Their school was small, with only one class for their year. When they got to high school, they were listed on their permanent records as soul-marked, so they were given the same schedule and assigned seats together. The administration was deaf to either of their protests—by this time, Ben’s contempt rivaled Armie’s—and so they lived their lives side by side, in mutual hatred.

In the privacy of his mind, Armie didn’t find it quite so easy to keep up his distaste for Ben. Over the years, Ben had grown irritatingly tall and broad, and with his thick hair covering those enormous ears, and his deep brown eyes, one could almost forget his large nose and scattering of moles. Not that Armie ever noticed them, or spent time cataloguing them as they sat beside each other in class. Not that he ever compared Ben’s muscled forearm to his own skinny freckled one as their arms lay close enough to touch on the desk they shared. Not that he thought of tracing from one mole to the next with a gentle finger, finding his way along Ben’s smooth skin to his heart. That would be ridiculous.

Next to their high school sat an old cemetery; crowded graves sunken into the grass, carved letters on the mossy headstones worn down to unreadable indentations. In the centre of the cemetery stood an old weeping willow tree, its long leaf-covered tendrils providing a tent-like enclosure, perfect for sitting under on warm spring evenings. 

Armie didn’t often come to these gatherings of friends. Ben was defiantly—if half-heartedly—dating Phasma, clearly hoping to provoke Armie’s jealousy. Thanisson and Mitaka, sickeningly happy together since the age of eleven, tended to sneak off to sit behind one of the more ornate monuments and sloppily paw at each other.

For some reason, Armie allowed Finn and Poe to drag him along one Friday night, reassuring himself that he could leave whenever he liked. They got there early—before nine o’clock—and the sky was still light around the edges, bathing everything in a soft grey-blue light. Ben and Phasma were already sitting with their backs against the tree talking quietly, but Ben’s head snapped up when Armie stepped through the curtain of leaves.

Out of habit, Ben and Armie pointedly ignored each other as everyone sat under the canopy of the willow, and conversation flowed between the others. After a while, Thanisson and Mitaka predictably sloped off to make out, and Finn had to go home. Poe, always a shit-stirrer, was the one to suggest they play Truth or Dare.

The first round went smoothly enough, with some rather tame dares going around the group. Spy on Thanisson and Mitaka without them noticing (not hard), climb the willow tree (easy), jump from the tops of one gravestone to another in a row (the path was familiar and the stones sturdy despite their age). Phasma was the only one to request a truth from Armie. He came up with some lowball question about her cheating on a test, not really caring about her answer.

A couple more rounds went similarly. Then the inevitable happened: Ben asked Armie for a truth.

“What’s your favourite colour?” Armie asked, not looking at him. He knew of course. He knew everything about Ben, even if they rarely spoke.

Ben snorted. “You know that, asshole. Ask me something you don’t know about me.”

“Fine.” Armie glared at him as he cast his mind around for something that only Ben would know. “What do you think about at night before you go to sleep?”

As soon as the words left his mouth he knew it was too much, too personal. Ben went very still and Phasma’s blue eyes widened. 

Poe shifted uneasily. “You don’t have to answer, Ben.” When he wasn’t busy starting trouble, Poe was always the peacemaker.

But Ben shook his head. “No, it’s the game. I’ll answer.” He looked at Armie, and in the dim light his eyes gleamed. “I think about getting out of this shithole of a town and getting somewhere in life. I think about never coming back here again.”

“Good,” Armie sneered, though his heart was pounding. Probably in excitement at the thought of never having to see Ben again. All he’d ever wanted was to be able to cut himself free from this person he’d been unfairly tied to. “I’ll help you pack your bags.”

Ben noticeably flinched. He still got hurt far too easily, even with Armie needling him all these years. It made Armie impatient sometimes—his soulmate should be mentally tough, like he had to be. Not that he’d been training Ben up to be like that or anything, but really. 

When Armie allowed himself to picture them together, as a real soulmated couple, he imagined himself having to stand up for Ben all the time, and comforting him whenever something upsetting happened. In real life it would be exhausting and tiresome, but most nights he couldn’t sleep without thinking of it. It was stupid—only in fantasy could the thought of caring for someone so outwardly strong be appealing—but it made him feel warm inside when he thought of holding Ben close in the dark, Ben’s head resting on his shoulder, his fingers sliding soothingly through Ben’s soft hair. 

Armie’s shoulders were too bony to be pillows though; the least of the issues with these soft-focused longings. 

The next round had Armie asking Ben for a truth. He braced himself. After his own wildly inappropriate question, he had only himself to blame for something similar.

“Why do you hate me?”

The question wasn’t unexpected. But Armie’s heart was still thudding in his chest and he could feel the heat rising in his cheeks. “I don’t—”

“—it’s called _Truth_ ,” Ben said loudly over him. “Not fucking _lies_.”

In a rare moment of parental concern, Armie’s father had explained that the name on his arm would be his one true love, a person he would be lucky to find. His father’s voice had been tinged with something like regret. Armie knew he was born from an affair, that Maratelle wasn’t his mother. He had wistfully imagined that his unmentionable mother had been his father’s soulmate, lost to a tragic early death. Only once had he seen his father’s arm half-uncovered, the brief glimpse of — _telle_ a shock of betrayal. 

That had settled it. If Armie’s father could cheat on his “one true love,” what was having a soulmate worth anyway? The whole thing was a trick, making you love the one person who could destroy you. At the whim of fate, Maratelle and Armie’s father were trapped together in a lifetime of perpetual ice-bound rage. If soulmates could live like this, Armie wanted nothing to do with his.

“I don’t believe in it,” he said now, trying to keep his tone lofty. “I think it’s dumb.”

“You’re fucking _lying,”_ Ben growled, always so quick to anger.

“It _is_ dumb,” Armie persisted. “Why should some mystical force decide who I’ll love?”

Ben surged to his feet, towering over the other three. “This is bullshit.” He stomped off into the distance, slamming the cemetery gate behind him with a rusty clang.

“You didn’t answer the question,” Phasma observed, after a pause.

“What?”

“He asked why you hated him. Not why you don’t want to be his soulmate.”

Armie was tired. Ben was right, this was bullshit. These games always ended in arguments or humiliation, or both. He stood, carefully brushing grass off his jeans. “I’m going.”

Phasma laughed behind him as he turned to leave. “You’re so much the same. Perfect for each other.”

Armie rounded on her. “We’re nothing alike,” he said viciously. “Besides, I thought he was _your_ boyfriend.”

“You’re an idiot if you think that he wouldn’t drop me in a second if you looked at him twice.”

Deciding that didn’t dignify a response, Armie followed in Ben’s footsteps, only stopping briefly to turn on his phone’s flashlight to find his way between the uneven graves out to the lighted roadway.

As he stepped through the gate, a shadowed figure was waiting for him, leaning against the stone wall that circled the cemetery.

“What do you want, Ben?” He tried to sound bored, but his voice shook.

The figure straightened. “You didn’t answer me.” Ben’s voice was a quiet rumble. Not quite threatening, but near enough.

Armie’s neck prickled in warning. “I don’t owe you anything. It’s just a game.” He tried to pass, but Ben blocked his way, grabbing his wrist.

“This is my _life_. It’s not a game.”

Armie twisted his arm, but Ben held on. “Let me go.”

“Not until you tell me.”

“What?”

“The truth!” Ben snarled in his face. “Why do you hate me so much?”

By reflex Armie could feel himself shrinking. Then he drew himself up. He wasn’t afraid of _Ben._ “I don’t hate you,” he insisted.

Ben laughed bitterly. “Right. No one is that good an actor.”

Fine. If Ben wanted to hear it: “I hated the idea of you before I ever met you. I don’t want a soulmate. Especially one like you.” 

Ben’s hand tightened painfully. Armie bruised easily, he’d have a purple ring around his arm tomorrow. It was the arm that had _Ben_ written on it; maybe Ben’s thumbprint would cover his own name.

“Why do you have to be so cruel?” Ben whispered. Despite the hold he had on Armie, all his threat was gone. He sounded confused, lost.

“Maybe I want you to hate me.”

“I’m _desperate_ for you.”

The words sliced at Armie, effortlessly peeling back the layers he’d spent so many years building to hide himself away. Ben’s hand loosened, but he didn’t let go. Instead his thumb rubbed a little circle on the sensitive skin on the inside of Armie’s wrist. It was too much, like Ben was stroking right on the raw edges of his exposed nerves. His chest ached and he couldn’t remember a time when it hadn’t. 

When Armie didn’t protest or pull away, Ben stepped closer. They were almost the same height, Armie only had to tip his head back a little to look Ben in the eye.

“I’ve seen you looking at me. I’ve _felt_ it.” Ben was close enough now that their noses could almost touch, his hot breath drifting over Armie’s mouth.

Armie swallowed hard. He was stripped bare, all his anxiously guarded secrets on show. Under Ben’s intensity it was impossible to lie. “I-I’m afraid of you. What you mean. I don’t want to belong to someone, to be...dependent.” As if he weren’t already hopelessly entangled.

“We would belong to each other, Armie. We already do.”

And then Ben was kissing him. It was nothing like he expected: noses were bumping everywhere, teeth painfully clacking together, and they were both gasping for air far too soon. But after a minute, they found a rhythm, and Ben’s tongue was a welcome soft-slick presence in his mouth, gently winding around his in a sweet dance that Armie couldn’t wait to learn all the steps to. 

Armie found his bony body fit perfectly against Ben’s solidity, the shift of muscles in Ben’s back so warmly alive. Ben’s hair was as soft as Armie had always imagined. He fisted a hand in it to pull Ben to him, feeling Ben’s smile against his lips. Ben’s large hand was made to rest on the nape of Armie’s neck, his thumb brushing back and forth along Armie’s hairline.

“I lied before,” Ben said into Armie’s ear as they took a break from kissing to breathe each other in.

Armie stiffened.

“No, no.” Ben rubbed his back reassuringly and, for the first time, Armie thought about Ben comforting him, and how good that could be too. “I meant— _this_ is what I think about at night. Holding you and being allowed to love you.”

Armie opened his mouth to say something cutting, but the words died on his tongue. Instead, he indulged in something he’d only fantasized about doing and buried his face in Ben’s neck, taking a deep, steadying breath. Ben smelled good, like the damp grass they sat on, like the bark of the willow tree he was leaning against. 

The ache in his chest eased as Ben drew him closer. He’d always been afraid the vise of Ben’s arms around him would leave him feeling trapped, that Ben would crush him without even noticing. But Armie felt lighter in Ben’s arms, like the almost-physical weight of his fears that had pressed down on him for so long was lifting and he didn’t need to keep pushing Ben away. He didn’t _want_ to.

“Yeah,” Armie said. “Me too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading my first Kylux fic! 
> 
> Comments and kudos are very welcome :) I'm [@isharan](https://isharan.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr - come talk to me!


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